Pub giant Greene King admitted its sales hangover from Scotland's new drink drive limits was set to continue until at least the end of the year after the rules have changed drinking out north of the border.

The Bury St Edmunds-based firm, that runs Hungry Horse and Loch Fyne Seafood and Grill, said the new rules had knocked like-for-like sales in its retail pubs by 0.5 percentage points over the past eight weeks.

Greene King, which recently completed its £774 million takeover of rival Spirit, said it expected Scottish sales to come under pressure until at least the start of next year.

Scotland introduced tough new rules in December limiting drivers to having 50mg of alcohol in blood, down from 80mg, making it lower than the rest of the UK.

Greene King said: "We have mitigated the impact as much as we can through a number of initiatives.

"However, the lower limit has changed consumer behaviour towards drinking out in Scotland and we expect to see continued like-for-like sales weakness, at least in the first full year following its introduction."

The comments came as Greene King toasted hitting more than £1 billion in annual retail sales across its managed pubs, hotels and restaurants in its first set of results since completing its acquisition of Spirit.

Greene King hailed an "exciting new phase" in the group's history as a result of the deal, which went through after its year-end and adds 791 retail sites and 416 tenanted and leased sites to its pub estate.

The group reported solid like-for-like growth across its three main divisions in the year to May 3, with retail sales up 0.4%, net income 3.6% ahead at its leased pubs and sales 4.2% higher for its brewing arm, which makes Old Speckled Hen and Abbot Ale.

But the group saw underlying pre-tax profits slip 2.7% to £168.5 million as profit margins came under pressure.

Pre-tax profits in the business excluding under-performing pubs that were sold off during the year rose 4.9% to £167 million in the year.

Trading in the eight weeks since the year-end has been "steady", according to the group, with like-for-like sales across its retail and managed pub arm up 0.6%, while net income in its leased pubs rose 1.2%.

But Greene King said sales in the retail business were knocked by 0.5 percentage points due to the impact of the Scottish drink drive rules.

It added that brewing volumes were 3.7% lower due to tough comparatives and a year-on-year delay in the timing of export sales, while Spirit's managed pub like-for-like sales were 0.8% higher over the past two months.